The Rambler, by S. Johnson, Volume 3

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1806
 

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Page 231 - Why am I thus bereaved thy prime decree ? The sun to me is dark And silent as the moon, When she deserts the night, Hid in her vacant interlunar cave.
Page 220 - Whom have I to complain of but myself? Who this high gift of strength committed to me, In what part lodg'd, how easily bereft me, Under the seal of silence could not keep, But weakly to a woman must reveal it, O'ercome with importunity and tears.
Page 230 - So much I feel my genial spirits droop, My hopes all flat, nature within me seems In all her functions weary of herself, My race of glory run, and race of shame, And I shall shortly be with them that rest.
Page 199 - Who dares think one thing, and another tell, My heart detests him as the gates of hell.
Page 227 - And buried; but, O yet more miserable! Myself my sepulchre, a moving grave; Buried, yet not exempt, By privilege of death and burial, From worst of other evils, pains and wrongs ; But made hereby obnoxious more To all the miseries of life, Life in captivity Among inhuman foes.
Page 232 - Whoever shall review his life will generally find, that the whole tenor of his conduct has been determined by some accident of no apparent moment...
Page 245 - When the excellence of a new composition can no longer be contested, and malice is compelled to give way to the unanimity of applause, there is yet this one expedient to be tried, by which the author may be degraded, though his work be reverenced ; and the excellence which we cannot obscure, may be set at such a distance as not to overpower our fainter lustre.
Page 64 - He who knows not how often rigorous laws produce total impunity, and how many crimes are concealed and forgotten for fear of hurrying the offender to that state in which there is no repentance has conversed very little with mankind. And whatever epithets of reproach or contempt this compassion may incur from those who confound cruelty with firmness, I know not whether any wise man would wish it less powerful, or less extensive.
Page 224 - This is undoubtedly a just and regular catastrophe, and the poem, therefore, has a beginning and an end which Aristotle himself could not have disapproved ; but it must be allowed to want a middle, since nothing passes between the first act and the last, that either hastens or delays the death of Samson.
Page 210 - He that can only be useful in great occasions may die without exerting his abilities, and stand a helpless spectator of a thousand vexations which fret away happiness, and which nothing is required to remove but a. little dexterity of conduct and readiness of expedients. No degree of knowledge attainable by man is able to set him above the want of hourly assistance, or to extinguish the desire of fond endearments and tender officiousness ; and, therefore, no one should think it unnecessary to learn...

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